


Sure as Water, They Will Leave You

by hoist



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: F/F, PTSD, Therapy, tags will change big time
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-29
Updated: 2018-04-29
Packaged: 2019-04-29 13:22:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14473632
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hoist/pseuds/hoist
Summary: Lena considers exciting new career opportunities! Results vary.





	Sure as Water, They Will Leave You

**Author's Note:**

> Years ago I found [a poem on tumblr](http://hoistdatrag.tumblr.com/post/58329110653/swallow) and I haven’t stopped thinking about it ever since! I reread it at least a couple times a month. It’s the cat’s pajamas. The bee’s knees. And is shrouded in complete mystery as I’ve had -0000% luck finding the author. If by some chance you know them, please holla. If by some chance you _are_ them, thank you for making it! (also, please holla.) Anyway, it’s what I ripped my panic at the disco title from eyyy
> 
>  **Rating and tags will change, and no endgame couples** but eventually tons of fodder for a few. This takes place before [Abattoir.](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14233131)

  


“I’ve been hearing a lot about those dogs that help,” Dr. Whitehead’s 2 o'clock begins, before she’s even settled in, gnawing on a shawarma wrap and threatening a vengeance of crumbs. “They train them up to help when you’re having an episode, yeah? Fellow from back in RAF got one a few months back. Not even big enough for the vest yet. Jack Russell, I think.”

 

“It’s quarter past, Ms. Oxton.” Dr. Whitehead hates to interrupt when a client starts so readily. But this is the second time in a row. With a couple of repeat performances, they’ll have lost an entire session. “Should we find a new time?”

 

“Oh no, yeah, for sure. It’s fine.” The client wipes the corner of her lips with a thumb. Then she pops it in her mouth to suck it clean, oblivious. “Do you work with any therapy dogs?”

 

Dr. Whitehead does not. However, he is familiar with the process. He asks how she would feel about having one.

 

She doesn’t pause, exactly. But her expression does twist as she wipes her wet thumb on her pantsleg. “I’d be worried, I think. Dogs are very into the smelling thing and you know, ever since the whole mess, I don’t rightly smell. Not as funny as it sounds.” Her eyebrows lift; she shrugs.  “A bit, though.”

 

“You can’t smell?”

 

She hums and shakes her head, just as she’s taking her last bite. This time crumbs _do_ spill. “No, _I_ don’t smell. And dogs like that kind of thing. I don’t smell right to them. _”_

 

The wrapper makes a racket as she crushes it into a lump and looks about. Probably for a trash can. Seeing none, she awkwardly drops it in her lap.

 

“Like, there’s no smell to me, understand. I go through bars of soap like a hotel.” She laughs. “Emily hated it!” She laughs again. “Every drawer and counter in the bathroom was choked up with the things. Scrubs and bath pods and like.” Her lips quirk. She scrubs her hands along her pants, only partly to fidget.  “Always fussed when she’d knock them over in the morning, trying to pull out the hairdryer.”

 

Dr. Whitehead begins note-taking. “Emily is your partner?”

 

“Ex. As of, oh --” she glances at her bare wrist, eyebrows bowed, “-- four months, say.”

 

He smiles politely at the joke. An Emily had come up in the first session, but this is the first she’s been mentioned in relation to a breakup. His client’s posture seems relaxed.

 

Whitehead tips his chin. “How are you handling it?”

 

“Oh, well as you can, I suppose. It was real cordial. Lovely gal.” She crosses her legs, ankle over knee, which knocks the crumpled wrapper to the floor. It goes ignored. “She didn’t stand a chance.”

 

Looking more closely, Whitehead thinks her posture is a little _too_ casual. Her fingers weave behind her neck and she reclines, grinning. There’s a cheeky wrinkle around her nose.

 

Dr. Whitehead makes note. “How long were you together?”

 

“Almost two years.” The muscles around her mouth flicker oddly. She might be biting the inside of her lip.  “Moved in after one, though.”

 

He hums. “Is that a bad thing?”

 

“Felt a bit fast. Be honest with you.” She looks sheepish. Her eyes track along the carpet, and the sides of her mouth twitch in, like they want to purse. “I’m a bit strange to live with.”

 

The note-taking pauses, but he’s not too obvious about it. “Strange how?”

 

“Quirks. You know.” Her fingers unthread from behind her neck and cross over her chest. The fit is tricky with her device. “You talk with a lot of vets, I’m sure you’ve heard most.”

 

Whitehead has. He also knows a waving-off when he sees one. He pulls back, deciding to see what surfaces. “I hear about a lot of sleeptalking, and patrolling the perimeter. Sometimes getting up and moving around in one’s sleep.”

 

He lets his tone at the end curl up in a question mark. A few moments pass before he gets a response.

 

“Sure. A bit.” She nods carefully. “Can’t really do a perimeter sweep in my flat, though. Specially back when Emily’s shit was all packed in.”

 

There’s a pause where it feels as though she wants to say more.

 

So. Whitehead waits.

 

The office is always sleepy-warm in the late afternoon. It won't be at its peak for another hour or so, but perhaps the coziness is what has his client a mite sluggish in her thoughts. She sits up suddenly, as though jerking awake -- lifts her hips, and scoots further back into the couch.

 

The leather sighs; she sighs.

 

The new position has her legs sticking straight out between them and crossed at the ankle. Her arms are still threaded protectively over herself, but one hand comes up to scratch at her chin. The look she gives is watchful. “What else you hear?”

 

He tries for a prod. “Relationship difficulties.”

 

She snorts, _loudly_ , vicious. They lock eyes. It’s not the first contact of this session, but by far the least comfortable. Whitehead is taken aback at the bald derision on her face. The tone had been so pleasant up to this point. It’s a blunt, unpleasant shock.

 

“Well. I told you about the toiletries.” She doesn’t look away, but something about her disdain dims as she cracks her knuckles against her jawline. “Suppose that’s a new one for you.”

 

True. He nods, waiting. Then waits a little more as she refolds her ankles -- other leg on top, now -- and drops her eyes along the carpet again. She wants to fidget but is resisting.

 

“I’ve got this habit, when I walk in the flat. Every time.” The corners of her lips tuck downward, and she takes a breath. “I say a greeting. Just sort of,” one hand opens in a shallow sweep, quick to pull back again, “to the whole room.”

 

The note-taking is more furtive, now. “What kind of greeting?”

 

“Any. All. I’ve run out of the regular ones.” One arm uncrosses, and she scrubs a palm over her lips.  “Like, ‘hello’ or the like. Only so many ways you can change that one.” Her voice softens at the edges, mumbling, “Been doing lines from the movies lately.”

 

“A kind of ritual, would you say?”

 

She thinks about that a moment. She shrugs, slow, lopsided -- and then shakes her head. “Mm... suppose not, since it’s different every time.”

 

“How does it feel, doing this every time?”

 

She shrugs again. Faster. “It’s just habit, now. You don’t really feel those. I bet you dump your keys on the kitchen counter when you get home or something, yeah?”

 

“I never think when I do that, though.” He’s dangerously close to contradicting his client. But he needs to see what’s going on here. “For something to change everytime, you must need to plan ahead.”

 

She smiles, but not to smile. Her eyes are tracking the carpet again. “Fair enough. I suppose it’s... mmm.” Her eyes come up, but not towards him. They cast along the side wall instead. “Comforting.”

 

Whitehead senses more, and waits.

 

“I don’t --” Her throat clears. “I don’t like things... all the same, all the time.” She wets her lips. “Routine.”

 

One of the more common barriers for veterans in reintegrating.  Holding a steady job, regular sleep habits, and managing domestic life with stability makes one predictable. Predictability makes one low-hanging fruit.

 

He nods. “Routine can get you killed.”

 

She doesn’t seem to hear him. “I take a different route every time I go to the supermarket for that exact reason.” The big bay window behind Whitehead takes her attention, and she gazes across at the buildings lining the opposite side of the street.  “Emily hated it. I’d get turned around and be late, all the time. When we’d meet up, after errands or such, sometimes I’d be an half hour over --”

 

Something clicks for Whitehead. Avoidance isn’t the issue. Just incompetence. “Have you had this happen on the way to my office before?”

 

The pause isn’t a typical one. Not a thoughtful one. He should not have interrupted.

 

“I have,” she says, slowly steering her attention back to him. Her face is wide with facetious awe.  “You’re _good_ at this!”

 

The acid disdain is back. Whitehead keeps his face carefully blank. He shifts in his chair, rumbling to clear his throat, and she watches him do it. He waits for her to continue where she left off and he is not obliged.  

 

His client folds her hands again behind her head. Whitehead again clears his throat.

 

“Are you a reader, Ms. Oxton?”

 

“Mm.” The sound is brickish with disinterest. “Here and there.”

 

He decides to take her off the defensive. The best way to do that is to talk.  “ _Johnny Got His Gun_ is a novel by an American writer, about the first World War _._ A man comes back from the frontlines in France as a victim of a mortar shell explosion. Most of the book revolves around his attempts to communicate with the nurses, doctors, and others around him in the hospital he’s kept in. Not only to share what he’s been through, but also to express his needs and desires. His rights and his will.”

 

He crosses his legs; unthinking, she does the same.

 

He goes on. “But it’s nearly impossible for him to do so. The mortar shell has left him quadriplegic, as well as deaf, blind, and mute.”

 

She _does_ seem more at ease now. But she watches no less closely.

 

“Of course,” Whitehead continues, “the biggest injury is his inability to communicate. And even a veteran who comes home whole --  _physically_ whole -- can carry that very same, invisible affliction.”

 

The pause this time is much softer. It’s meditative. And though Oxton’s coached her expression into something opaque, the warmth she originally brought into the room is returning by degrees.

 

Whitehead is getting to be an old man. His hips creak as he leans forward in his chair, and the notes half-crumple as his elbows brace on his knees. But he needs every gram of candor available. Their eyes meet again, and he takes a breath to speak.

 

“It can be difficult to talk about it. Any of it.” His voice is gentle. “Combat can take that from us.”

 

He does not expect his client to grimace. She doesn’t seem to realize she's doing so. Her head shakes against something, something making its way up -- she takes in a breath -- but then her head shakes again and she settles back in her seat, radiating frustration.

 

“Not the combat that's done it in for _me._ ” She scrubs a hand over her face, rough, twice, and scrapes her nails against the back of her neck. Her voice is mottled. “Combat’s all that _helps,_ sometimes.”

 

Whitehead stares, a little deflated. “What?”

 

She looks up. She smiles. It’s not a kind smile. She raps a knuckle against the device in her chest:  _Tap, tap, tap._

 

“It’s a similar trauma,” Whitehead replies, smoothly. He has no idea if that’s true. His hope had been that that particular topic would wait for a later session, after more time for research on his part. “And trauma of every kind can always be difficult to talk about.”

 

She says nothing. After a few seconds, her arms cross again.

 

He senses the momentum faltering. He has to press. “Could you talk about it with Emily?”

 

“Could.” The corner of her lip twitches and her eyes go back to the carpet. “Didn’t.”

 

“Why not?”

 

The corner of her lip snags up in a grin. It doesn’t quite reach her eyes. “Someone’s got to pay you, mate.”

 

On the surface, of course, it’s just another misdirection. But Whitehead decides to assume there’s something underneath.

 

“It can feel burdensome to our loved ones,” he soothes. “Some find it a relief that a therapist is paid to listen. Would you agree with that?”

 

She’s nodding, half attentive. 

 

“With Emily, did you ever try?”

 

She's still nodding as she mulls it over. Eventually slows to a stop. 

 

Whitehead waits.

 

Her lips part. She takes in air, but her mouth closes again. A string in her jaw flickers. When her gaze comes up from the carpet and locks on Whitehead like a mortar shell, her eyes are bright with illiterate suspicion. "What counts?"


End file.
